Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?

[somethingillremember]

Originally Posted by Afrobean

That's a problem that religious folks seem to have.

It's not predictive if it's not "understood" until after the fact. Well crafted metaphor can be interpreted many ways. The reader will always paint their own beliefs onto it and look for things they know of. That does not mean that the person who "predicted" those things knew they'd happen, it just means that they gave enough vague detail that another person could fill in the rest.

This is a logical fallacy.

Something which is truly predictive would be understood before the thing has happened.

That isn't necessarily true. Imagine two people were stuck in a room for their whole life, and one of them gets a vision of a sunrise which he describes as "A great ball of flame, growing on the Earth". Then he dies, and the other person cannot figure out what he means by "A great ball of flame, growing on the Earth". Finally, he escapes the room and sees a sunrise. The man instantly realizes what the other man saw in his vision. The man who escaped wouldn't say "Well, obviously he didn't predict anything because I did not know what it meant until I saw it. In fact, he could have meant something totally different." He would say "HOLY ****! So that's what he was talking about!"

The passage is here: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...209&version=31 (it's Daniel 9)
The 70 weeks interpretation of Daniel is pretty dang solid. I don't think that there are very many other interpretations that suit the passage well.

Originally Posted by Afrobean

That's the point I was trying to make.

Basically, you're believing something that is absurd, because if you didn't believe in it, you wouldn't believe in it. Does that make sense?

ABSOLUTELY NOT. That's why it's so absurd. What reason is there to believe that Jesus was resurrected? Because if he didn't rise from the dead, then the whole religion is based on a lie?

Jesus taught some great things, but come on. He doesn't have to have risen from the dead to be worthy of notice. His stories should be placed alongside the greats of the ancient world, along with the stories of the Greek Heroes. There's plenty to learn from it, but to literally believe this absurd stuff is just... absurd...

The reason I believe in the bible is because God has showed me throughout my life how it works (I know that you don't believe this, so note that I am not trying to attack anyone, this is just my view). Also, Much of the new testament was written after Jesus' death and resurrection. If you look at the bible correctly, it makes sense and it all fits together. So I don't believe it because I believe it, I believe it because it makes sense to me.

Not only that, but the whole message of the Gospel is very different from that of other world views and religions, that Jesus died and saved us, and we are no longer under obligation to follow the law. You see, I have learned that trying on my own to follow the law does not work, and if you get to the point where you are following the law, the you are just following a bunch of arbitrary rules. In my view, God is perfect, and so even if I got to the point where I was obeying "the law" I would be radically far from perfect, which is what is required by God. In fact, the reason for the law, in my view, is to lead us to Christ, not to be applied to your life, because even the Old Testament law before the 10 commandments (it had over 600 laws) was incomplete. "Sin" is not just disobeying the law. The whole nature of humans is sin, and as humans we are constantly sinning. So it's not just like I sin here and there, and if I just fix those few things, I'll be alright. My whole thought process is sinful, and I constantly sin in everyday life. In my opinion, people who are Christians that are "trying their hardest" to obey the law aren't looking at it the right way because that's a bit like saying "Jesus' death on the cross wasn't enough for me, I still need to work to earn my salvation." Instead, in my view, it has to be looked at like "I'm messed up, I can't possibly change myself, and I need God to save me and change me." When I look at it like that, then I am relying on God to change me, not my own works. Ephesians 2 talks all about this, as well as many other places in the New Testament, like for most of Galatians, and for alot of the gospels, and in fact for most of the New Testament, really.

Wow. I got really sidetracked there.